About

RickB- Human, Artist, Fool.

Ynys Mon, UK.

The blog is called ten percent because of what Kurt Vonnegut wrote when remembering Susan Sontag - She was asked what she had learned from the Holocaust, and she said that 10 percent of any population is cruel, no matter what, and that 10 percent is merciful, no matter what, and that the remaining 80 percent could be moved in either direction.-

And I'm writing it because I need the therapy and I lust for world domination.

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They’ve had a very busy week and of course they still have lives to lead, families to look after. The site Raytheon9.org should get updated over the weekend. A helpful person has sent me a quick email report:-

Basically, things are going very well indeed and Raytheon have shown themselves up in front of the jury as the heartless capitalist bastards that we knew they were. We had one of the UK Board of Directors in the witness box on Thurs and Fri. He was so arrogant and sleazy that I suspect he will have won us the case single handed. He ended up saying that he ‘didn’t know’ whether it would be lawful for Raytheon to continue to sell weapons to someone/country that had been shown to be committing war crimes. He also said that they saw ‘no point in engaging with’ those who oppose the arms trade, even if elected politicians. Once the trial is over, we will try to write his evidence up so we can share it.

Best of all, the judge showed a minute of news footage of the aftermath of the Qana bombing when this guy was in the witness box. It was great to see him forced to look at their handiwork, but he didn’t seem to have a heart and just looked away with a kind of sneer on his face….the jury was not impressed. “David and Goliath” was mentioned by one of the barristers…

The defence is starting on Monday with Eamonn McCann in the witness box. The trial may be over by Thursday, definitely by Friday of this week.

Thank you for all your solidarity. We really appreciate it.

Meanwhile the Borders & Immigration Agency and the figures behind the treatment of Hicham Yezza show they are sore losers, press release from freehichamyezza.wordpress.com–

Following the cancellation order on his deportation and despite being unjustly incarcerated for over two weeks, Hicham Yezza has received news that he is to be transported to a fifth detention centre. He released this statement today from Colnbrook immigration removal centre:

“I have just been informed that I am to be moved to a detention centre in Dover. This would be the fifth movement in 9 days and is therefore unacceptable. It is deeply saddening for both myself and my visitors; it is also a great source of distress at this time and an affront to human dignity and my human right to be treated with respect and consideration. I am thus categorically refusing to go.

I am not a piece of luggage but a human being, and deserve to be treated as such.”

Despite the existence of a long term facility adjacent to Hicham’s current location he is once more being transported. Hicham’s dignity should not come second to the interests of private sector detention centres whose main aim is to delay release procedures and maximise profits. Given that the outcome of his bail application is imminent further transportation is unnecessary, such disruption would not only violate Hicham’s right to private life through contact with visitors and the outside world, but also places a needless burden on the tax payer.

Also the BIA never rest-

Hich’s case has attracted an unusual amount of attention due to the nature of his original arrest, but, in a political climate increasingly hostile to migrants, the horrific way he has been treated by the immigration authorities is all too common. This week alone, two asylum seekers living in Nottingham, Mary-Jane Mutetsi and Amdani Juma have been detained.

Just a still frame but worth it ‘cos this is the full 8min+ version, always uplifting, great as encouragement and also as celebration and we did win one tonight (one small step but nevertheless, move on up!). Plus it’s a cracking early summer evening here so the music suits, Enjoy!

PRESS RELEASE REGARDING HICHAM YEZZA
30/05/08
At 12.30 hours today, an application to the High Court in London was issued seeking a judicial review of the decisions of the Home Office in this matter.
The removal directions set for Sunday 1st June have now been cancelled by the Home Office, and an application will be made to them this afternoon for Mr Yezza to be released while his case is reconsidered.
David Smith, of Cartwright King solicitors in Nottingham, says “We hope and trust that the Home Office will now release Mr Yezza and reconsider his case properly and in accordance with the law; we will proceed vigorously with the High Court action unless they agree to do so.”

I am sure that you understand that for Data Protection reasons, British Airways cannot comment on any passenger’s travel arrangements to a third party.

British Airways has a legal obligation to remove passengers from the United Kingdom if instructed to by the Home Office. We contravene the Immigration Act 1971 if we refuse to do so and could be prosecuted. Any objections that you may have relating to deportations should be taken up with either the Home Office or the UK Border Agency. The concerns raised in your correspondence have been passed to the UK Border Agency at Heathrow.

**UPDATE2: The campaign blog has removed the call for faxing probably due to the concerns raised that busy fax lines could prevent essential legal documents getting through at this crucial stage. As I understand it the Border and Immigration Agency & Colnbrook detention Centre need to be contactable. But you can still contact your MP and let British Airways know how dimly you view their cooperation.

Update: A commenter adds this caution-We need to be able to ensure that Hich gets a faxed copy of his, hopefully, successful Judicial Review Application and the important Crown reference Number on it, so that, if the application is successful, and if Immigration claims not to have received notification it is important that we can get a copy of this document faxed to him.

nb. Webusers sign up at http://www.interfax.net/en/ no obligation and introductory free faxes from email. [nb. the sign up can be slow and could require an overnight wait, that still leaves all of Friday]

Today at the University of Nottingham academic staff gave a public reading from an Al-Qaeda training manual, outside the Hallward Library, University Park Campus. The demonstration expressed the outrage amongst staff and students after two innocent members of the academic community were arrested under ‘terror’ legislation in connection with this document, downloaded from an official US government website.

Given there is just today and Friday as working days they are clearly hoping to get out of the office on Friday evening without answering for their actions then let the procedures of deportation take over for the weekend. So phone calls, emails and faxing are at this point the best means of delivery-

Donate to Hicham’s legal fund….
Donations should be transferred to the account on the name of Camille Herreman (sort code: 400205, account no: 81474715). If you think that you can help, contact Camille Herreman on this number 07961925788 to ask about any related information.
sort code: 400205
account number:81474715
iban number: gb44midl40020581474715
internation swift code: midlgb2140c

Send a message of support/solidarity to Hich. Please consider faxing, writing or calling in your messages of support. Hich says: “Messages of support have been truly humbling and have sustained me through this difficult and harrowing time. Keep them coming!”
Colnbrook IRC
Colnbrook by Pass
Harmondsworth
West Drayton
UB7 0FX
Phone: 020 8607 5200
Fax:020 8759 7996

Lecturers voted today to try to stop the fast-track deportation of Hicham Yezza, the Nottingham University staff member detained on May 14 under anti-terrorism laws before being released without charge. Nottingham University called in police when Yezza, a former student working in an administrative role, was found to have a copy of the al-Qaida training manual.

On his release, Yezza was re-arrested and transferred to an immigration detention centre. He is due to be deported to Algeria on June 1. A last-minute motion put to the University and College Union annual congress in Manchester today said: “Hicham has lived in Britain for 13 years. The Home Office is attempting to deport him next week, leaving lawyers little time to prepare his case and preventing a proper hearing of Hicham’s case.”

Nottingham University released a statement you can read in that article they are basically doing the least possible they can. As a commenter wrote here–

I was considering going back to Notts for my Masters, but there’s no way in hell that I will do that now. If the university considered the topic of Al-Qaeda that sensitive, then they shouldn’t have approved the dissertation in the first place! What an incompetent bunch they are!

The University will lose students and thus revenue if they do not robustly defend their staff, students and academic freedom. I’m sure it could get along as some glorified toytown further education college but when your idea of academia is whatever the domestic security forces tell you it is, you are not a serious contender.

And CrimeWatch style here’s your chance to re-enact the crime he is being persecuted for-

1. This document should not be identified as an “Al Qaeda” manual. This identification was applied falsely by the US Department of Justice as public relations gambit after 9/11 to promote the Global War on Terrorism. The term “Al Qaeda” does not appear in the document.
2. The genuine Al Qaeda training manual is much longer, about 5,000 pages (compared to 180 pages for this document), contains far more detailed and superior information than this derivative product, is now in its third edition, and is offered on a variety of web sites, which change over time, and all of which appear to be password restricted.

<…>

A reader suggests comparing with manuals of the School of the Americas:

More than 100 nations have reached an agreement on a treaty which would ban current designs of cluster bombs. Diplomats meeting in Dublin agreed to back an international ban on the use of the controversial weapons following 10 days of talks. But some of the world’s main producers and stockpilers – including the US, Russia and China – oppose the move. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown called it a “big step forward to make the world a safer place”. He announced earlier that Britain would be taking cluster bombs out of service.

A spokesman for the British Foreign Office had said one of the sticking points was expected to be the issue of interoperability. This involves deciding how to deal with a situation where troops from a country that has signed the treaty are involved in coalition operations with forces from a country that has not. Another point of contention was the degree of obligation that should be placed on signatories to clear unexploded sub-munitions.

The BBC’s Paul Adams said he understood the agreement would effectively outlaw the two cluster munitions currently held by UK forces, but would not prevent countries from developing future generations of weapons based on the concept of sub-munitions. He said it appeared the UK was seeking a deal which other countries not present in Dublin, notably the US, might be persuaded to accept later.

The United States has not sent an envoy to the conference, but the UK’s involvement may increase pressure on the US to become involved. The US says that the proposed convention would hinder humanitarian activities because its military has such weapons on its inventories. Stephen Mull, an assistant secretary of state, said: “Any country that signs the convention in effect would make it impossible for the United States or any of our other allies who rely on these weapons to participate in these humanitarian exercises.”

Israel, Pakistan, China and Russia, along with the US, are among the main producers and stockpilers of the weapon. They all oppose any ban. Britain did not initially express support for the ban, but appears to have changed tack.

“The US says that the proposed convention would hinder humanitarian activities“, war really is peace to the Empire. See the list of users, producers and stockpilers. During the Lebanon offensive in ’06 the UK refused to back the ban, so assuming there is not overwhelming small print and this is not a big load of spin this is a significant change of policy. So bye bye to-

the lsraeli-designed M85 artillery weapon used during the 2003 invasion of Iraq and in attacks on Lebanon two years ago; and the M73, part of a weapons system for Apache helicopters.

But lots of work to do, the Empire and its zionist chum are still cluster crazy and these countries need massive clean ups-